In a timely tribute to political disobedience Russell Miller covers the 2002 WOMBLES trial, a brave and ultimately successful challenge to spook intimidation.

Even enemies admit NFB persistence. Updates include Special Branch as well as MI5 connivance in Nazi DAVID COPELAND's 1999 nail-bombings. For the first time Searchlight's infamous strategy document detailing their destabilising of anti-EU groups is published in full. Pseudo-investigative journalist DONAL MACINTYRE is well tackled by Micky Droy. Lying MI5 toad DAVID SHAYLER (Mustoe not Juninho) is nutmegged again. Following warnings last issue, we examine why the BRITISH NATIONAL PARTY has won 18 council seats, and outline a non state-compromised strategy for reversing this.

Not for Guardianistas/those lacking an attention span: NFB not MTV!! A joy to some, a nightmare to others...

EDITORIAL - NOTES FROM THE BORDERLAND ISSUE 3

Amidst the fog of battle enveloping Iraq, few clouds were more poisonous than those created by the information war, with psy-ops techniques honed in Northern Ireland and elsewhere deployed as frequently as air strikes

NFB is fully committed to using our small resources to encourage resistance in the information war back home, now. The recent inquest into Dr David Kelly's death, while heavily circumscribed, has nonetheless opened up the spook world to a slight degree, and shown what vain, evasive and insubstantial creatures they really are. The necessary role performed by a magazine like ours is not glamorous or popular, but essential--and not at all futile. More than ever, to follow Gramsci, occupying the political and moral high ground in the war of position is our aim.

Long-term NFB readers well know the malign effects of spook intervention in politics, recently questioned from a surprising and respected quarter. For 20 years Lobster magazine, edited by Robin Ramsay, has pioneered parapolitical research in the UK, and he continues to publish regular as clockwork twice a year [see web-site www.lobster-magazine.co.uk]. Others in the field owe Lobster a great deal, as do I for publishing my research and defending me against outrageous personal attacks. Lobster's work on the Wilson Plot, the secret state conspiracy to overthrow an elected government, is exemplary and still fresh. More recently, Ramsay uncovered New Labour's transatlantic connections. In Lobster 44's editorial. Ramsay remarked that Lobster's original "chief focus was information on the intelligence and security services" but "these days such information is available in abundance and I see little point in simple collation". I agree--there is little point in 'simple collation', but parapolitical investigation isn't or shouldn't be collation, but placing individual and agency actions in strategic context. 'Abundantly available' information, if not appropriately used, might as well be hidden in a locked vault. In these information-conscious times, spooks do make such available--but in a limited and distorting way. For example Eliza Manningham-Buller's CV, explored in our first article. Information about her aristocratic antecedents was available, but until now nobody had looked, or placed such in perspective, surely the job of irregular magazines like NFB (or even Lobster).

Ramsay also claims that "spooks don't seem as important as they did". Wrong. There is an incontrovertible elementary sense in which spooks are more important today than ever before. In not just Guantanamo Bay, but the UK, individuals can be arrested, imprisoned without charge and the keys thrown away simply on the unchallenged say-so of spooks. Thereby reverting to a medieval situation obtaining before Habeas Corpus and Magna Carta. And there should be no doubt that even those of us on the outside are under increasing threat--interception of phone calls email and post has doubled under New Labour from 1,370 in 1996 to 3,427 in 2001. Secret state interference in social life takes two further distinct but related forms. First, as well as targeting individuals, they engage in infiltration, manipulation, disruption and intermittently direction of so-called domestic subversives, now re-classified as terrorist or terrorist-linked to maintain the legal fiction counter-subversion is no more. Ample evidence of this engagement can be found throughout this issue, whether it be (defeated) attempts to fit up the Wombles, shocking revelations about the 1999 David Copeland nail-bombings or indeed possible MI5 involvement in Princess Diana's 1997 death. The longest article covers Peter Taylor's three part BBC documentary devoted to counter-subversion (particularly Special Branch), and amply illustrates spooks are important. As too does the hard fact Special Branch numbers have doubled from 1,638 in 1978 to 4,247 in 2002, according to official HMIC figures. A second form of spook interference is via the media, including liberal conduits like the Guardian/Observer axis.NFB got stick from Lobster for examining the output, and probing the allegiances, of Observer Home Affairs editor Martin Bright. I stand by what I wrote, and feel NFB vindicated by an affidavit from Bright admitting that "most [media] organisations designate a journalist who will deal with eachservice .... ln the case of the Observer, I deal with MI5". Had Bright revealed this before asking me detailed questions about NFB, I'd have told him which bridge to jump off. Nor, I suspect, does Bright routinely alert others he gathers information from. Bright's affidavit justified refusal "to elaborate further on this relationship" as "this is not possible without identifying the individual involved or jeopardising the Observer's lines of communication with the intelligence services" [seeObserver web-site Libertywatch campaign dated 21/7/02]. Lines of communication are two way, so I need say no more other than to ask who the accredited links to MI5 MI6 and Special Branch in other organisations are. .

We are in for the long haul, and so return to previous stories. While the EU intrudes little this issue (lots next) other than in a fascinating disinformation strategy document, Ufology again features, Max Burns describing a chilling operation i against both him and the truth. More old friends (not) David Shayler & Donal Macintyre have recent antics analysed, to the credit of neither. They and others cynically calculate that because they cannot answer NFBs questions, the best tactic is to publicly ignore us. A position that cannot hold for ever, or even long. The fortunes of the British National Party (BNP) are again reviewed, necessarily so given their disturbing recent electoral success. We also explore the BNP's relationship to the secret state--not as a side issue, but as characteristic of our broad scope. To end on a positive note, the last editorial urged action on the Cope land case: new information published this issue was provided by brave people who have put themselves on the line. Now is the time for this and earlier information to be widely disseminated, so those in Special Branch and MI5 who gave this Nazi low-life license to commit murder are called to account as he has already been. That Is important.

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About NFB Magazine

Welcome to Britain's premier parapolitical investigative magazine Notes from the Borderland (NFB). We have been producing the magazine since 1997 but some published material before then.

Our political perspective is Left/Green, but we welcome truth-tellers, whatever their affiliation. Research interests include the secret state (MI5/MI6/Special Branch, now SO15) & their assets, including those in the media. We are resolutely anti-fascist, and to that end investigate the far right and state infiltration of various milieus. In a shallow age where many TV programmes and print/internet stories are spoon-fed to servile journalists/bloggers by shadowy interests, NFB stands out as genuine investigative research.

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